Easter's A Reality That Cannot Be Undone Or Removed

April 04, 1985|by REV. JOSEPH MOHR, The Morning Call

When Dr. Liston Pope was dean of Yale University Divinity School, he said: "Anintelligent and successful friend of mine told me . . . that he is appalled by the notion that he might live forever. He said, 'I'm sick of myself, even before I am old, and the idea that I might go on being myself forever is too dreadful to contemplate.' "

Dr. Pope also pointed out that the idea of immortality has been renounced by many thoughtful persons: "George Bernard Shaw once designated as the ultimate in selfishness the hope that one's own puny life would go on forever. The German poet Heine cried out: 'To vegetate through all eternity . . . no such everlastingness for me. God, if He can, keep me from such a plight.' "

It's amazing what stupid ideas the intellectuals can entertain. Only the most intelligent can make the most asinine assumptions about the hereafter. Why should Heine think that to live forever means to vegetate forever? Even in this existence, humanity has risen far above the vegetable kingdom, although it's possible to vegetate if one so chooses. It's the height of folly to suppose that because we can't imagine a future world better than this one, God can't imagine or create one either.

If Shaw and Heine couldn't get up enough courage to commit suicide, they no doubt had reasons for living just another day, and if content to live on here, why not there?

Those wise men assumed that all one would have to do in a world to come was to lie selfishly on a hammock under balmy skies and sip lemonade all day long. Are the intellectuals so lacking in imagination that they can't hope that perhaps in the world to come there might be more exciting adventures than in this world? I have enough faith in the creative skill of the Eternal to believe that He can produce even more interesting worlds than this and that life in His kingdom will never be dull or lacking in constructive purposes.

Isaiah quoted the Lord: "For behold, I createnew heavens and a new earth; and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind." St. Paul quoted Isaiah: "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him."

Jesus Christ designates himself as the Resurrection and the Life, who can make all things new.

Too many literalists start demanding proof of a resurrection before they will believe. But if a matter can be proved, it doesn't have to be believed. Jesus starts from a different point of departure. He would say: "Do what I command you and then you shall know and see. Find the new life in me and then you can believe life is worth living now and in a world to come." Like Doubting Thomas, we want proof, but Jesus said that blessed is he who believes though he has not had proof.

Jesus said He came to give life and to give it abundantly, implying that the quality of eternity must be added to this present existence if we would know life's meaning. If a man or woman can't find the meaning of existence now, he or she probably won't care to prolong the present, meaningless existence which only marks time until death mercifully intervenes and releases everybody from this dungeon of life.

Easter is God's way of showing that Christ is exactly what He claimed to be - the Resurrection and the Life. He would not have been true life had death defeated Him, and He could not have been the Resurrection had He not possessed the true life. A resurrection without true life would indeed result in an existence as meaningless as this one is without true life. And the possession of true life now can result only in a rising from death, for it is life that can't remain dead. The Resurrection and the Life belong together.

Easter is not what you or I can believe or invent or disprove. It has nothing to do with humanopinion, fancy, or wish. Easter is a reality that cannot be undone or removed. Its message goes on, proclaiming that He who is the Resurrection and the Life is Lord of all. Easter centers in Him who said, "I am the Resurrection and the life; he that believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die."